WITNESS Media Lab | Perpetrator Video Archives - Page 3 of 6

11 Apr Purpose

| WITNESS PURPOSE Storyful’s goal was to source, verify, and archive key content emerging from the large volume of eyewitness- and IS-published media online, and make sense of that content to allow our news partners to tell a coherent story. We broke the down what we found

11 Apr Introduction – Case Study 2

| WITNESS INTRODUCTION - CASE STUDY 2 Since its establishment in 2014, Islamic State has used a highly effective media strategy to spread its message, wage a propaganda war, and recruit adherents online. It has produced material extolling the benefits of life under Islamic State, the power

11 Apr Case Study Conclusions

| WITNESS CASE STUDY CONCLUSIONS This case study shows the benefits of taking a structured approach to monitoring a single incident of this kind, applying Storyful's methodology of building reliable local sources to follow a story as it develops. Facebook is by far the most used and

11 Apr Ethical use of perpetrator content

| WITNESS ETHICAL USE OF PERPETRATOR CONTENT Collecting and analysing perpetrator content raises several ethical concerns, both in terms of the potential impact on journalists or investigators, and because of concerns relating to the use and dissemination of such material and the risks to the safety and

11 Apr Archiving content and associated metadata

| WITNESS ARCHIVING CONTENT AND ASSOCIATED METADATA The verification process allowed for the identification of source, date and location of a number of these videos. This was done by following the story through to its completion, the release of some of the hostages, at which point we

11 Apr Video 3: Suad Adeeb Abu Ammar tells stillbirth story

| WITNESS VIDEO 3: SUAD ADEEB ABU AMMAR TELLS STILLBIRTH STORY Source: Islamic State via Sweida Hostages Page (Activist page) (Confirmed) Location: Unknown location near Safa. (Corroborated) Date: August 12 (Checking) Archived here. A third video emerged on local Facebook pages on August 12. The video (archived

11 Apr Video 2: Fadya Abu Ammar speaks to camera

| WITNESS VIDEO 2: FADYA ABU AMMAR SPEAKS TO CAMERA Source: Islamic State via Najeeb Abu Fakher (Activist) (Confirmed) Location: Unknown location near Sweida (Unconfirmed) Date: July 31 (Corroborated) Archived here. A second woman, Fadya Abu Ammar, appeared in a video circulated on social media on Tuesday,

11 Apr Video 1: Suad Adeeb Abu Ammar speaks to camera

| WITNESS VIDEO 1: SUAD ADEEB ABU AMMAR SPEAKS TO CAMERA Source: Islamic State via Najeeb Abu Fakher (Activist) (Confirmed) Location: Unknown location near Sweida. (Unconfirmed) Date: July 28 (Corroborated) Archived here. A video (archive) and photos (archive) of the hostages emerged on local Facebook news and

11 Apr Role of Perpetrator Video

| WITNESS ROLE OF PERPETRATOR VIDEO Hostage-taking during a conflict is a war crime. IS used the hostages captured in Sweida to negotiate for the release of prisoners held by the Syrian government. During the negotiation process, IS fighters produced, or allowed the release of, a series

11 Apr Relevant Reporting

| WITNESS RELEVANT REPORTING Following the IS attack on Sweida, local sources reported on the abduction of civilians. Storyful’s years of reporting on the war in Syria allowed us to create lists of reliable sources, catalogued for internal use with relevant information: names, translated names, logos (where